I have always lived my life under one rule. Never think too much into things. When I am not sure of what to do, I tend to just close my eyes, open up my arms, lean back and let myself fall. Life has always caught me on it’s winds of change and carried me to where I needed to be. I know that this world in which we live in is just temporary. What we do in life will not matter once it’s over. What matters is what we have learned while we are here. And the lives we have touched that are left behind. I have always felt alone in thought. I would sneak out of the house at night as a child not to go out to parties or meet girls outside of their windows. (Well not all the time anyway). Instead I would sneak out to wonder though the dark of night alone. Either to ride my bike down quiet streets or to stroll through the paths of the orange groves that surrounded my house. Something about the shadows of the moon and the quiet of the hour that opened up my thoughts. Desperate to be a part of a world I never felt a part of.

You see I am a solipsistic romantic. Most writers I believe are. We live on the crossroads where the lines become blurred as to was is reality and what is our reality. And although writing has taken the backseat to life these days. I will always consider myself a writer. Words understand me far more than people ever will.

“My imagination makes me human and makes me a fool; it gives me all the world and exiles me from it.”
― Ursula K. Le Guin

Living with solipsism isn’t always a clear path. It leaves a lot of room for doubt and confusion. You see for someone like me, the world does not exists. My thoughts make up my own reality. I see you only in the way I created you to be. Therefore nothing is real. The Kabbalist and the Buddhist of the world understand this concept all to well. They have built their entire existence around it. Love and happiness, agony and pain are all just ideas planted into our thoughts by those who do not know their own mind. They are the chaos caused by the confusion that we have self-inflicted.

Being one who romanticizes everything, well that’s where things tend to get a little abstract. For how could one love anyone but their self if they are all that is real. The need to belong tends to outweigh reason. The human condition tends to put a clock to discovery. Tic-toc, tic-toc. Time is a constant reminder that it is limited. We are all given a day to understand our purpose. The universe was created in six. So one would assume we were given plenty of time. The problem most people run into is that they are forever looking to others for guidance. They listen to words other than their own. When in reality, the answers have been in-bedded in our minds all along. Sorrow, self loathing and grief are trademarks of those who lack understanding. We all know the truth, it’s right in front of us. The fact that we are all here is proof of life, the fact that we all think is proof of creation. Most people just hide from it. They succumb to instant gratification so often that they are blind to purpose. The result is a guilt that tells them that the Devil made them do it. That temptation was just too strong. That addiction is just too powerful. They create a world without light so they can hide in the darkness in the hopes that no one will notice them. You can’t go to church and confess the sins that you yourself created. You can’t pray for forgiveness when there is no one else to blame.

“The bonds between ourselves and another person exist only in our minds. Memory as it grows fainter loosens them, and notwithstanding the illusion by which we want to be duped and with which, out of love, friendship, politeness, deference, duty, we dupe other people, we exist alone. Man is the creature who cannot escape from himself, who knows other people only in himself, and when he asserts the contrary, he is lying.”
― Marcel Proust

I have never been afraid of what the future brings. It has been planned out long before I arrived. All I can do is sit back and enjoy the ride. They say when one door closes another one opens. They are partially right. But in the world of the solipsistic romantic there is no need for doors for there is no walls. We see the rails the train is rolling down and understand that without the tracks the train no longer moves forward. It’s just a matter of making things interesting as we continue through the journey. So we close our eyes and dream.

I am reminded of a girl I knew in my youth. In my reality we had this long drawn out romance all through school. I made these huge romantic gestures. I planned out chance encounters and deep conversations. I wrote love letters and left flowers. For me it was very real. Even 35 years later I can remember every moment. But to her it was nothing more than absent. She can not remember a single rose, a single note. She can’t remember the kiss, the connection or the poetry. She can’t remember… well me.

You see we create a reality to fit our needs. We see people how we wish to see them. If we have the power to create our own universe, why not make it a good one, where every day is a new romantic grand gesture. After all it’s my day dream. If your life becomes a nightmare, well time to wake up and redirect your thoughts. I’m not saying that bad things don’t happen in life. But it’s how we perceive those things.

Life is perception.

“Maybe each human being lives in a unique world, a private world different from those inhabited and experienced by all other humans. . . If reality differs from person to person, can we speak of reality singular, or shouldn’t we really be talking about plural realities? And if there are plural realities, are some more true (more real) than others? What about the world of a schizophrenic? Maybe it’s as real as our world. Maybe we cannot say that we are in touch with reality and he is not, but should instead say, His reality is so different from ours that he can’t explain his to us, and we can’t explain ours to him. The problem, then, is that if subjective worlds are experienced too differently, there occurs a breakdown in communication … and there is the real illness.”
― Philip K. Dick

I will fill my life with happiness and adventure and love. I have no idea just where I will find myself when the train finally pulls into the station. I like to think it will be a reward for a life well lived. But until I reach my destination. I am going to be the creator of my own world. I may not always be able to control my dreams, but I can surely influence them.

“The very essence of romance is uncertainty.”
― Oscar Wilde,

“We live and we die, anything else is just a illusion. Delusion detests focus and romance provides the veil.”
― Suzanne Finnamore,